Love others 3

I - Half Cleaning the house

I am really good at half cleaning the house

INTRO-

We have been talking about what it means to follow Jesus and what it means for our church to follow Jesus together. And I see this impulse at work in myself when it comes to following Jesus.

I believe scripture points to three things as foundation for living out faith.

And I see this impulse at work in myself when it comes to following Jesus.I believe scripture points to three things as foundation for living out faith.LG LO MDGC and GCMatthew 22:34-37

LG LO MD

GC and GC

Matthew 22:34-37

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’  38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Jesus says everything hangs on these commandments.

This week our focus is Loving neighbor or Love Others. And sometimes when I am presented with that call to LOVE OTHERS I would rather do just about anything else and I don't think I’m alone in this.

W- Try to Love God w/o loving others

We are pretty good at loving people

When it doesn't cost much

When people are lovable

The easy to get along with

People like us

Those who love us.

We all have people we know God is calling us to love, but it seems like too much work. We hesitate

The needy

The needy

The different

The difficult

Its when we encounter the kinds of people that are hard for us to love that we start to get creative in how we see Jesus words here. right? I know I do.

Jesus coundn’t have meant it like that!

Don’t hate, tolerate

cultivate warm feelings

accuse others of not loving

Try real hard to love and get discouraged

What about bad people?

What about sinners?

What are the limits?

Even bible commentaries try and find ways out of this one.

We become more difficult to nail down on this than Jello!\

We know loving others is important, but when it comes to certain people we would rather not.

We would rather

Love God and Love our Friends

Love God and Love family

Love God and Love our political parties

Love God and love country

Love God and love people who love us

Love God and Love neighbor is just too much

But if you are going to follow Jesus, there isn’t an easy way out of this one.

Jesus during his time on earth drew near to the most difficult people and loved them. ANd he told everyone to do the same. TO love Neighbor as SELF, and then he did it.

People resisted, questioned, and challenged.

People tried to find the boundaries, the minimums and the limits. To wiggle out in all kinds of ways, just like we want to.

But Jesus refused to limit his call to love others, in fact he broadened it.

Where we constantly look for ways to narrow the scope of love, Jesus said this in what I think of as one of the most challenging passages in all of scripture

27 “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,

And he lived it out. So much so that hanging from the cross he says “Father forgive them for they know not what they do.

I dont think there is anyway we are getting out of this one.

Try as we might, and belive me we have, there is just no way to read *this* book and come away with anything else than the very foundaiton of what it means to be a Christian is LOVING OTHERS, even enemies, not just in feelings but in practical ways.

Jesus is not kidding when he says everything hinges on this.

But when I look at it honestly it just seems like too much. Its too big. And I start to worry.

“am I loving others enough” What if i don't make the cut? How could I possibly to this enough for GOD.

We despair or we clench our fists and get ready to do some LOVING.

We spend our energy and our anxiety trying to do it enough. And then a week from now we quit because we jsut dont have the sterenght.

But the bible actually talks a little differently.

In , ; The author is reminding the readers of things they already know, but may have forgotten.

, 19-

9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

21 a

19 We love because he first loved us.

reminder sermon

This doesn't sound like white knuckling it to me.

1 John seems to say. That the ability to love others comes out of God’s love for us.

“We Love because he first loved us.”

This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

If you want to learn to love others we have to start with this.

God Really, really, really loves you. PERIOD (elaborate)

EVEN THOUGH YOU DONT DESERVE IT. (elaborate)

The bible says its only when we understand our lives out of that foundational truth, that we can really love others w/o running dry.

WHEN you embrace God’s love for you, so much that he died on the cross when you did nothing. You realize that its not about pleasing God to recieve his love. YOU ALREADY have it!

You are loved by God.

Know that GOd loves your brothers/sisters your friends, your relatives, your aquaintaneces, the people that drive you crazy, the peopel that scare you, yes even your competitors and enemies.

GOD LOVES THEM JUST LIKE HE LOVES YOU. The same way. Its not that if you fail to love them God will be disapointed in you or whatever. Its that THEY ARE JUST LIKE YOU, as a reciepent of love, LIVE LOVE.

And how could you love God without caring about the people he cares about? Yourself, but also others.

puts it this way.

“we love because he first loved us.”

IF YOU GROUND YOUR LIFE IN GOD”S LOVE. Loving neighbor as yourself becomes possible.

Y - A challenge to LOVE

Trans: How can we respond to the self Giving love of Christ, we pour it out to others.

So start with those who are near. With those God puts in your path.

Here are some next steps you can take to live out God’s love for you in the lives of others.

One idea: Love others Wall

Pray for someone

Write a note

call/visit/pray

take somone out to lunch

Talk saves lives

Challenge this week

Share love with 3 people this week out of the love God has for you.

1 here at church.

1 family member or friend.

1 enemy or stranger.

W - We love, because first loved us

Loving others is Core to the gospel is so incredibly important to God that he calls it one of the two things that everything else in scripture hangs off of.

Without getting this right, we are missing the point. With out love for others everything we do together as a church is hollow perhaps even destructive. That is why it is core to our mission, that we would be a people known for love of God and love for neighbor.

May we know God’s love for us and share it wherever we go. May we be known as a people whose love for God is made complete in love for others.

Lets pray together.